Pros

Educational.
Informative.
Beautiful illustrations and diagrams.
Includes audio and video.
Integrated with social media.

Cons

Several violent illustrations of dinosaurs killing or eating might be disturbing to some sensitive or squeamish children.

Bottom Line

The Ultimate Dinopedia iPad app is an introduction to the world of dinosaurs, and highlights numerous species.
Although it's geared toward children, it's fascinating for dino enthusiasts of any age.

9 Sep 2015Tony Hoffman

The Ultimate Dinopedia: Complete Dinosaur Reference ($4.99) is an iPad app that takes a close look at some of the great reptiles that once roamed the earth. It is a rich multimedia experience, combining concise yet informative text, spectacular artists' renderings of dinosaurs and their habitats, video animations, and audio pronunciation guides. It's geared toward grade-school children, but should fascinate teens and adults as well, and is a great choice for anyone who loves dinosaurs.

The app is based on a National Geographic book that's intended for ages 7 to 10, but with multimedia content (animations and audio) added. The Ultimate Dinopedia is informative and beautifully illustrated. The writing and vocabulary are at a level befitting the app's intended age group, and err on the side of simplicity when possible. For instance, carnivores and herbivores are referred to as meat eaters and plant eaters, except in the glossary. Other, more technical terms are used when needed, such as the names of the two main classes of dinosaurs: saurischian (lizard-hipped) and ornithischian (bird-hipped) dinosaurs, and many of the dinosaur names, such as micropachycephalosaurus, are real tongue-twisters for people of any age. Fortunately, there are sound clips in which the names are pronounced, accessible by pressing a speaker icon.

Design and Features
Ultimate Dinopedia is for the iPad only. I tested it using an iPad Air 2. The app is designed for use in Portrait mode. There are three main sections, which can be accessed through a table of contents icon (four stacked horizontal lines within a circle) that appears on each page. The About This Apps section has a pull-down menu with options like Meat Eaters, Plant Eaters, Discovering Dinosaurs, Dinos A to Z, and About this App. Another menu item, Table of Contents, contains links (illustrated with dinosaurs) to the aforementioned sections, along with instructions on using the Table of Contents icon: "Tap this icon to switch sections." At the bottom of the Table of Contents are icons for email, Facebook, and Twitter, and you can share a link and a pre-written description of the page you're on (or whatever text you want to replace it with).

Snapshots From the Age of Dinosaurs
Most of the app is devoted to the individual dinosaurs, one screen for each species. The bulk of each dinosaur page is taken up with the artist's rendition of one or more dinosaurs from the featured species in a prehistoric landscape, often interacting with other dinosaurs, pterosaurs, insects, marine creatures, and in at least one case, mammals. Some depict deadly confrontations and others, more placid scenes. The illustrations are colorful and artistic yet as scientifically accurate as possible. For instance, one illustration shows velociraptors as feathered, as they are now believed to have been. What we know about some of the dinosaurs depicted only comes from one or more incomplete specimens, so of necessity the artist was given extensive license, and the results are stunning.

Navigation
On each page, the dinosaur's name is shown in the upper-left corner, followed by a phonetic spelling of the name. At the upper-right corner, the dinosaur is identified as a Meat Eater or a Plant Eater, below which it is grouped into one of several subclasses. For instance, the first dinosaur in the app, Eoraptor, is classified as The Meat Eaters/Early Dinosaurs. Some dinosaur pages also include a video link, which shows a brief CGI clip of how scientists and animators think the dinosaur may have moved.

Tapping the top of any page brings down a bar. From the bar, you can press one of five icons that let you perform different functions. You can go to the app's Home, to another Table of Contents in the form of a pull-down menu from which you can navigate to any page in the app (showing the dinosaur's or page's name plus a thumbnail), or back to the preceding page. There's a star icon for favoriting your current page, and a thumbnail carousel of the app's full set of pages, from which you can navigate to the page of your choice.

At the lower-left corner of any dinosaur page is a stacked menu of four items: Dino Stats, The Story, Fun Fact, and Picture Info. Tapping Dino Stats brings up a box that stacks the words Name, Meaning, Period, Found, Fossils, and Length, and follows each with information. For instance, for Eoraptor, the name's meaning is given as Dawn raptor, and the Period (meaning the geological period it existed) is 225 million years ago, Late Triassic. Found (where its remains were located by archeologists) is Argentina, Fossils (i.e., what exactly was found) include skull and leg bones, and the Length given is 5 feet (1.5 meters). There is also an illustration of the dinosaur's silhouette in comparison with a human silhouette.

Tapping The Story section from the lower-left-hand menu brings up a box with a paragraph or two of text, which although brief, is informative. In the case of Eoraptor, under the heading Honored Ancestor are two paragraphs saying that we don't know what the earliest dinosaur was, but the oldest known dino fossils are from as-yet-unnamed dinosaurs recently found in Madagascar. Eoraptor itself is a very early dinosaur with some unique features, such as a fifth finger where other dinosaurs had four or fewer. Also included is a speaker icon, which you can tap to hear the dinosaur's name pronounced, as well as listen to the item read aloud.

Tapping the Fun Fact menu item for Eoraptor brings up a photo of an Eoraptor skull, with the words "Paleontologist Paul Sereno says that when he discovered the beautifully preserved, sharp-toothed skull of Eoraptor, he cried with joy."

A Dino Primer
The app's Discovering Dinosaurs section provides some general textual information about dinosaurs, illustrated with color diagrams. The first entry, titled What Is a Dinosaur, describes (and shows, using diagrams) what physiologically distinguishes dinosaurs from other species. An entry called Dinosaur Worlds provides details on the geological periods in which the dinosaurs lived, along with maps showing how the continents changed over time between the Triassic, Jurassic, and Cretaceous Periods. The Dinosaur Habitats section explores three common habitats in which dinosaurs lived—shores, forests, and deserts—and discusses how because of long-term geological and climatic changes, the places where fossils are found may bear no resemblance to what they were like in ancient times. For instance, the Sahara desert was a forest, western North America an ocean, and Antarctica's climate was much more temperate.

An entry called How Fossils Form describes the fossilization process, and the circumstances required for a dead creature to become a fossil. Life on Earth describes the different geological periods in Earth's history, the points where different types of life developed, and where dinosaurs fit into that progression. Another entry, Dinosaur Family Tree, displays a timeline showing how dinosaurs developed from small lizards some 230 million years ago and branched into their two main categories (saurischia and ornithischia) before becoming extinct some 65 million years ago, leaving only the birds as their descendants. A series of entries describes the life cycle and behavior of dinosaurs, including courtship and mating, dinosaur eggs, bringing up baby dinos, migration and herding, weapons (claws and teeth), hunting, scavenging, and defenses (herds, huge size, armor).

Also included are brief bios of the great fossil hunters who discovered numerous dinosaurs, a map of Earth showing where important finds were made, and an account of what paleontologists do on a dig and in the lab. One section, Great Dinosaur Mistakes, chronicles some scientists' misconceptions about dinosaurs, while another, New Dino Discoveries, discusses some of the latest species to be found. A section on other animals that lived concurrently with dinosaurs discusses the pterosaurs, the ichthyosaurs, and the plesiosaurs that plied the skies and seas of our planet during the age of the dinosaurs. Contrary to popular belief, they are not actually dinosaurs, although they are distantly related. The section also mentions mammals, most of which were tiny, but would come to dominate the world when the dinosaurs were gone. How the dinosaurs went extinct is also covered. An asteroid impact is highlighted, but other events (volcanic activity, slow climate change) are also considered, along with the possibility of some combination, such as an earthquake or an asteroid impact plus a tsunami.

Dinosaurs A to Z gives an alphabetical listing of the dinosaurs in the guide, with essentially the same information found in Dino Stats. plus a tiny illustration of each, and a speaker icon that you can press to hear the dinosaur's name pronounced. The final section, About the App, includes a glossary of dinosaur-related terms, and comments by the author and the consulting paleontologist, along with brief bios of them, as well as the illustrator.

Ultimate Dinopedia is quite different from March of the Dinosaurs, an iPad app based on a TV special that presents a fictional account of the lives of several dinosaurs in the midst of a great migration. March of the Dinosaurs is a visually rich work of fiction based on our best understanding of dinosaur behavior, and is both informative and entertaining. The Ultimate Dinopedia is a nonfiction reference that tries to present numerous species based, in many cases, on limited information. Both apps are spectacular, and make good use of multimedia content.

Carnivorous Behavior
One caveat that I raised in March of the Dinosaurs is equally true, if not more so, with the Ultimate Dinopedia: Be sure that your child is emotionally ready for the app, even if they're within its target age group. Violence is depicted in many of the illustrations, including dinosaurs eating other dinosaurs or locked in mortal combat. Although children are aware that not all dinosaurs were peaceable creatures (they only need to have seen a preview for Jurassic World to figure that out), and most won't be surprised or alarmed at the depiction of carnivorous behavior in the app, you're the best judge of your child's sensitivity and whether the app might be upsetting to him or her.

Conclusion
Ultimate Dinopedia is a fascinating look at a huge selection of dinosaur species, some of them well known and others obscure. The text is informative and at a reading level suitable for the children for whom the app is intended. A good overview of paleontology, illustrated with useful color diagrams, is included. The illustrations of dinosaurs, and how their long-ago world may have looked, are stunning. The app makes good use of multimedia, including CGI videos and audio clips of how dinosaur names are pronounced. Ultimate Dinopedia is a great choice as a reference app for dinosaur enthusiasts of any age, and wins our Editors' Choice as an educational iPad app.

About the Author

As Analyst for printers, scanners, and projectors, Tony Hoffman tests and reviews these products and provides news coverage for these categories. Tony has worked at PC Magazine since 2004, first as a Staff Editor, then as Reviews Editor, and more recently as Managing Editor for the printers, scanners, and projectors team.

In addition to editing, Tony has written articles on digital photography and reviews of digital cameras, PCs, and iPhone apps

Prior to joining the PCMag team, Tony worked for 17 years in magazine and journal production at Springer-Verlag New York. As a freelance writer, he’s written articles for Grolier’s Encylopedia, Health, Equities, and other publications. He won ... See Full Bio